A Week to Remember

Now it's Monday, 14 Jan 2008. What a relief! I have just gone through a nerve-wracking, energy-sapping, emotion-draining week!

Gardy Labad and I met with Director Ted Romo of the Department of Social Welfare and Department, Region 7, last Monday. We went through the basic concepts of creative industries and what is known as ABCD or Asset-Based Community Development.

The following day we had the consultation meeting with Mayors and/or the representatives of the six municipalities of Bohol where the Kalahi Creative Industries Development Project (KCIDP) would be implemented on a pilot basis. The Mayor of Pilar would like the project implemented immediately in his municipality. The others preferred to be assisted first in explaining the project to key sectors in the municipality, most especially the barangays.

KCIDP is not the type of projects municipalities are used to. This will be focused on creative industries considered as assets at both community and household levels. What everyone is used to are projects on basic needs: water supply and santitation; roads, clinics and other infrastructure; assistance for malnutrition or households with school dropouts, etc. Teatro Bolanon will present a cultural showcase to help communities be aware of their cultural and arts assets. Hence, the planning for creative industries will start not with the usual identification of needs and problems.

Local planning will start with a process of identifying assets. BLDF has taken the challenge of producing the survey methodology and the software for this revolutionary approach and link these tools to Poverty Databased Monitoring System (PDMS) developed as pro-poor targeting tool based on basic needs approach.

On Wednesday, I had to fly to Manila to meet friends from UNICEF and CIDA in efforts to get some support for developing the ABCD tools. There's some hope we could get CIDA to co-share with BLDF the support for the IT programmer and specialist. In exchange, BLDF will make available data that could be used by CIDA for writing up case studies.

Habitat Malaysia waits eagerly for the outputs which can be used for a community survey in cooperation with University of Malaysia Sabah.

Thursday I had to spend almost half a day with Habitat Philippines so we could finalize my work plan for the first quarter of the year. We had to agree on the case studies to be undertaken and on the role I have to play in implementing the ADB urban project.

Friday I had to pick up the CD on a friend's funeral from Guadi. We had to meet for this at the Greenbelt chapel. By late afternoon, I was back to Bohol to meet Erin Hoffman and the BLDF team. Erin had arrived earlier from Boston College to start a four-month internship with BLDF.

Saturday I had to meet them again at our place in the village. Then the news was broken to me gently by Jojie about the passing away of my close friend, Atty. Nitz Cambangay, who just retired as Provincial Planning and Development Coordinator. All of us were shocked by the news. We met with him 04 January to finalize plans for the registration of a new entity, the Institute of Poverty Studies and Governance.

Afternoon of that Saturday I had to rush back to Baclayon Church to serve as sponsor in the wedding of Toby Martin and Dagni Aya-ay. Prior to that I had to attend a wake for the mother of the former Mayor's mother. Shortly before midnight, when the wedding reception ended, I went with the family to visit Nitz at Funeraria Gomez. The place was full of people. We emphatize with Helen's situation, who now must confront a future without Nitz.

Early Sunday, after attending morning Mass, we went back to Nitz where he seemed only sleeping there and for the first time during the week, I had moments to recall how we conspired to make poverty not only a "showbiz" issue, but the overarching theme of all development plans here in Bohol.

We will go on with this journey and this is probably the best way to remember our friend and colleague, Nitz Cambangay.